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While a certain amount of triumphalism is understandable for supporters - such as myself - of now Justice Kavanaugh, it should be tempered by a sober analysis on what this episode suggests about the state of the culture. Indeed, in turn, on what this suggests about the future of political debate in the country.

To start, speaking as a Republican who is not a fan of President Trump and is well aware of his party's own philosophical failings. It is fair to say that the Democrats set the stage for this debacle. When Judge Bork's reputation was successfully besmirched all the way back in 1987, followed (less successfully but no less scurrilously) by Justice Thomas in 1991, followed by Democratic Leader Reid's opportunistic abolition of the filibuster for lower court judges, the stage was set.

When Republicans blocked even consideration of President Obama's nomination of Judge Garland to the Supreme Court, and their subsequent abolition of the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees, the Democrats howled. Republicans shrugged. The Democrats had started down this road and so Democratic angst rang hollow.

Fair enough. However, it is not clear where this leads, other than to yet more of the same. Now amplified by technology fostered street demonstrations and - in extremis - mob violence. This cannot be to the good.

Equally as alarming is the ease with which the Democratic party - the party of civil rights - abandoned that commitment to due process and innocent until proven guilty. The procedural barriers to tyranny are always fragile in the best of times, that they were so easily tossed aside in this case is alarming.

(In this connection, Senator Feinstein's - a Democrat for whom I normally have the highest regard - sitting on what amounted to allegations of a crime is hugely disappointing, to say the least. She will deserve the ethics investigation her office is about to get.)

To be sure, we have been here before. The 1960s and 70s were an era of social tumult, though this era is perhaps exacerbated by a technology that reinforces people in their own mental universe. Empathy is difficult in the best of times, now we use devices that make it that much harder.

Republicans can, on the whole, take credit for acting dispassionately in this case. Chairman Grassley acted honorably and fairly. However, that was today. The fuse has been lit as each side will invariably draw the wrong conclusions for this episode.

The smear campaign was too much. There is something called innocent until proven guilty. When a Judge has a stellar record for 20 plus years, vote him in. The Democrats turned this into a circus. There are plenty of actual offenders that could be punished, because there is actual factual evidence. Cory Booker, Willy Clinton, just to name a couple.

His "stellar record" included lying under oath to congress in 2004 and 2006. In any reasonable period of history, that would have been enough to disqualify him.

Congress was only allowed to see 80% of his "stellar record" as a lawyer working for the Bush administration, at a time when the administration authorised massive eavesdropping on citizens and, you know, torture. What was in the other 20%?

Now you're just pointing out that the US is a shitty country when it comes to human rights, what's your point?

Mine is that Kavanaugh worked for Bush on the team fighting Bush v. Gore, then all through the time they started mass surveillance of US citizens, tortured people and started using drone attacks in foreign countries. Any or all of which he could have been forming legal arguments for, in the 20% of documents that the White House kept out of sight of the members of the Senate Judicial Committee.

And the Republicans, to a Senator, voted to confirm someone who was proven to have lied under oath, which 20 years ago they thought was enough to impeach a sitting president.

Most Helpful Girls

I think that it doesn't matter. You can't wait until someones running for office to decide "hey! I can use this to get back at him" I support her telling her story, and to to him, but if both swore on oath, somebody has to be lying. It is just time for anyone or everyone to stop holding in situations like this, and come out and tell the truth. It is ridiculous how Brett got off the hook for false accusations, but for bill cosby, he got sent to prison. Im not sure if he admitted what he did though.

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I stayed neutral as I could in the process even now not totally sure. I believe something happened to Dr. Ford and the issue was whether Judge Kavanaugh was invovled or not. Nothing was proven so he was rightly confirmed. The Democrats behaved disgracefully, my contention was that if the positions reversed Republicans would do same in a heartbeat.I suppose one of the wider issues was is this a #MeToo backlash and what happens if backlash goes too far. I really feel that as long as current polarisation is around there will be swings to Liberal side and to conservative side with every possibility of both sides going too far - I don't know how often I say this on GaG but is the middle ground completely gone, forever.

A woman who is credible, and has lead a life without controversy toward men, who says she was sexually assaulted, deserves real attention, and a real opportunity to tell her story. She also should not be considered a liar, if she acts like many other sexual assault victims, and does not remember the details of the surrounding, but does clearly remember being sexually assaulted and by whom. This is very common with sexual assault victims, as is not telling anyone for a long time after the assault, including years after the assault. Credibility should be lent to her story, if she has had an respectable life, has passed a polygraph test, and the one accused is a heavy drinker. She should further be believed, if the accuser is petulant, accusatory, and derogatory toward those questioning him. And if he refused to take a polygraph test, and the so called investigation into his actions is nothing more than a sham, to pull the wool over the eyes of others.

Wouldn't say he triumphs, there are no winners in this one. The democrats look like evil bullies who care little about democracy and should never be voted on again while he got his reputation publicly slandered and will always be seen as a serial rapist by some people. At least the whole thing fell flat.

I heard he isn't a great judge but after all that it would be weird if they don't pick him now he is proven innocent.

I do believe he didn't do it but where there is smoke, there is fire. The smoke screen was something else. Amateur dems playing dirty. The worst attempt of character breakdown backfired! Someone didn't do their homework. Ford was not sincere enough. As humans, we have innate ability to tell if someone is sincere. Unfortunately, although the platform of $metoo movement is good to expose real abuse, this was not one of those cases. This hurts the cause rather than helping.

At this point i am pretty sure it is, the accusation was vague and the people testifying did not back it up. On top of that there is a politically motivated reason behind the allegation which means the only reason it was brought up in the first place was so the democrats could have there way. Its safe to assume its a false claim, but if you don't want to go that far a more correct way of calling it would be a claim without evidence.

@sawno I don't think it's necessarily false. What it doesn't have is evidence, which the problem with that is, is the timeline. However, just because something has political motivation doesn't mean it's a false claim. It means they're weaponizing a claim, which is terrible, but it doesn't mean the woman wasn't raped.

@sawno Indeed, but again, that doesn't mean something didn't happen. I think it's false to call it a false claim unless it came out there was a proven conspiracy or she admitted it. I'm not saying it was true, but I'm certainly not going to say its false either.

That is fair, it stems to how far you are willing to go in an assumption.Clearly for me that a bit further then it is for you.So lets agree its a claim without evidence where he should not be seen as a rapist or as someone who is guilty.

@sawno I do not think he should be considered a rapist, but I wouldn't be the one to put someone accused of rape in a position of power if I had the decision. It's bad association and it's going to be damaging for the republicans as they will be seen as rapist sympathizers, whether or not he is actually guilty.

I disagree, the man isn't convicted of anything.It would mean deplatforming culture is effective where you can influence entire nations just by making a false allegation. We would then see rape claims on anyone with power true or not for the sheer basis of riling up society against them which sets an incredibly dangerous president. The founder of the linux foundation is never alone with women in a conference for that specific reason, he always wants to have a witness that NOTHING happened.

@sawno It doesn't matter if he's convicted, what matters is there was a very public battle with a witness who seemed genuine and the FBI was involved. His name is ruined now whether people want to acknowledge it or not.

Yes, his name is ruined now. But name ruining should not be an effective tactic because then we will see that much more often. By taking a firm stance on this matter that the claim holds no evidence and appointing him because of it not only restores his reputation a bit it also means that these tactics are proven ineffective and won't be repeated as easily.

@sawno I'm not saying it should, I'm saying it is. Either way, the Republicans are going to look bad. I don't make or necessarily agree with the rules, but considering the guy in charge, America looks like an anti-woman, rape-supporting, anti-victim shitheap to most people outside of it.

I am not American and i would consider it a just action to appoint him even if i disagree with some of his earlier rulings. Instead i see the democrats as a vile bunch who will stop at nothing to obtain power even if it destroys the entire democratical system of the country.

@goaded there have been a couple but one comes to mind. He was a big trump hating liberal. I just politely said that I appreciated all the work he was doing to help Trump... his rhetoric. Then he said if he ever saw me on the street he would smash my face in. Go ahead and defend him I know you will.

"but I wouldn't be the one to put someone accused of rape in a position of power if I had the decision."Then it's a good thing you DON"T have the decision. Because it would mean that no one would EVER get appointed. The opposition would simply make an allegation, and kill the nomination.

So: It seems you may be just like the lying president, who likes to denigrate and spread hate. What hole is there in the soul of a person who has to do that, and who is a follower of a person who does that?

So: Just for starters, he lied about seeing thousands of Muslims happily demonstrating in the streets of Newark, on 9/11. And he lied about the access hollywood tapes. First he apologized for what he said, then later, he said it was not him on the tape. A lie. Can you honestly picture Trump apologizing for something he didn't do? But in reality, Trump has lied and lied and lied. If you haven't seen that, it's because you don't want to see it. I haven't time to give information to the willful blind.

Sososinaxoxo: Much of what I said Trump lied about, is on tape. It really takes some delusional thinking, some real immersion into the Trump Cult, to believe that tapes lies, and to directly see and hear Trump say something, then he lies about it later, and believe Trump told the truth all along. That's more like Jim Jones and his cult, than any thing else.

There is not evidence to conclude the allegations were false no more than there were to conclude they were trueAll that can really be concluded is that it has become any means necessary for the agenda for both sides of the political spectrumWonderful news for society...

@goaded these are just my hopes but ofc he will not sue them as the GOP won't let him. All the story was a legal dead end where nobody was able to proove anything and there was no legal charge actually so it's just a distraction media campaign, cheers.

@goaded dude according to your details you're a 53 y. o. grandpa with 11% mho. That means you have no clue, honestly. I believe you're just trolling, b'coz only <11% clueless people would believe the MSM TV bullcrap.

@goaded dude your best arguments are the BBC newsfeed, so your ones suck as hell. There's a good saying of Trump regarding all the story: "The democrates will never win as they are just mob. In the USA there will be always the rule of the law, not the rule of the mob"

@goaded dude if you don't understand something it's not my duty to explain you. Go learn or sumthin. Even the FBI knew the absurd of the issue, so they wouldn't put much effort. It's not an FBI job to investigate "he was laying on me" allegations hahaha. Go jerk or something, you'll feel easier.

@WhitePanther88, dude, there are paid trolls, bots everywhere, don't waste your time, dude. The whole Hillary campaign was fueled by the army of facebook bots when IRL they had like dozens of people at her rally vs thousands at Trumps'. And after that they blame Russia for hacking. So don't waste your time arguing with the bot army hehe =D

@goaded yeah I believe that was a misunderstanding in the beginning. I just hoped he would've sued them all. However, obviously it's a hard work. But the moral damage was done, so, at least the media should account for that.

The allegations were neither proved nor disproved. A vote was held and in my opinion someone unsuitable for the court was confirmed no a party-line vote since that's how US politics goes these days. I'm inclined to believe the women.

Have a look at the history of supreme court nominations; there has always been the option of a filibuster, nominees have always had a timely hearing, and the appointee has always passed with a considerable number of opposition votes. Until now, and that's not because of the Democrats.

@goaded What just happened is qualitatively different from what has happened before, with the exception of the Clarence Thomas confirmation, another shining moment of Democrat lunacy. The results will become obvious next month.

i don't have the words to say how much i don't carestop inviting me to share opinions on American politics

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Anonymous

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Kavanaugh is completely innocent. Those three women lied.

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Opinion Owner

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@markscott Of course. When it comes to Kavanaugh, we dims use the same way of proving truth, from false lies. With Trump, if the news praises him, it's false. If the news doesn't praise him, it's true. The same goes for Kavanaugh. If the information praises him, it's false. If it does not praise Kavanaugh, it's true. It's a very simple way dims can determine truth from false.

Have a look at the history of supreme court nominations; there has always been the option of a filibuster, nominees have always had a timely hearing, and the appointee has always passed with a considerable number of opposition votes. Until now, and that's not because of the Democrats.